This blog is now closed. I've moved to www.volatilefiction.co.uk

Human nature

22 December 2012

Despite my grumbles about the Hobbit being made into three films instead of one, we did go to see the first of the new trilogy today and enjoyed most of it. I'm assuming that readers of this blog will have read the book so can go on to say that the way they handled the troll scene really irritated me. The whole point of the scene in the book (about the use of wit instead of weapons) was sacrificed in favour of an all-out action sequence, seemingly created by nervous film executives for the attention-span-of-a-gnat generation.

My favourite scene? When Bilbo's hobbit hole was being slowly taken over by strangers and he was trying to make his fury known by repeatedly saying "I'm sorry". That clip should be shown as an instructional video to people emigrating to the United Kingdom.

In other news, Lucy Mangan's columns in the Guardian Weekend magazine are always good but today she really excelled herself with a well observed, poignant column about the luck of the draw:

I consider myself lucky. But, despite all their wealth and security, I suspect our political and business leaders never think that of themselves.Do they never have moments when the weight of their astonishing luck makes them buckle at the knees and fall to the ground in gratitude? I suppose not. It can only be by thinking yourself entirely responsible for your own fortune that you can think of all those who are poorer, less successful or less independent of the state as personally responsible for theirs. Thus they deserve punitive policies and sanctions designed to remedy their immorality and sloth. A moment's honest thought, that's all it takes. I wager that you'll agree, because I wager you have them yourself. It would take an inhuman, almost sociopathic degree of arrogance and lack of imagination not to.

I have often wondered whether most people born into exceptionally lucky circumstances or those who have had the fortune of an unusually lucky break ever stop to think about the ratio of luck versus their own efforts; whether they have narrated their situation internally so that they deserved it, were entitled to it and therefore feel arrogant and protective about it. Many people in positions of power, especially in politics and leadership roles tend to hold "lesser beings" in thinly veiled contempt.
Things like the workfare scheme in the UK have, quite frankly, been a disgrace.

09 November 2012

This August, the Oasis game came to the UK for the first time and was played in Silvertown, a corner of Newham in East London. I attended the training program and project weekend, along with several other Lush employees and a handful of other participants. This is my personal diary from the experience.

Donating to charities is a comfortable way to tell yourself that you’re “doing your bit”. Being somewhere in person – now that’s a different story. How much easier it is to allow a certain sum of money disappear from your bank account every month to “good causes” than to actually get your hands dirty.

I don’t see myself as an activist. The thought of chaining myself to a fence does not fill me with excitement (I merely wonder “how do they go to the toilet?”). Volunteering for any kind of direct action seems like an alien, unknown experience. And to finish off the excuses my internal dialogue has been dishing up, I have no useful skills for volunteering work. I’m not a social worker, builder, campaigner or green hero. By the standards of the Bigger Picture, my work is airheaded – I’m a perfumer. I’ve spent my whole life selling, marketing, creating or applying potions and lotions. It brings joy to individuals, yes. Does it make money for the people I work for? Absolutely. Does it make the world a better place? Well, yes, in many ways - but not in the grand way I have always imagined the Heroes of Activism go about things. They travel to disaster areas and build bridges or climb on top of coal power stations. They throw rancid butter onto the decks of whaling boats. I’m not cut out for that. I’ll just peer at them admiringly from afar.

I might have gone on to believe that I was unsuitable for any kind of volunteer project, but something happened. Ruth Andrade, our environmental guru at Lush showed us a video made in Brazil, her home country. Ruth is a powerhouse of a character; a true inspirational leader. Spending any amount of time with her simply leaves you a changed person. It is impossible not to be influenced by her in some way.

In the video, Edgard Gouveia Júnior from ELOS institute explained a new concept: what if we could change the world by playing a game? What if we could approach a difficult situation with a different attitude? What if everyone could find a way to contribute, regardless of what kind of skills they have? What if we didn’t treat people in disaster zones or poverty as victims? What if we found a way to connect to them and work with them and leave behind a lasting legacy?

This was the Oasis game concept, first born in the favelas of Brazil. Architecture students ditched their indoor classrooms and took their desks outside – amongst the people whose lives their work would be influencing. They involved the community directly and the results were breathtaking. This seemingly small step led to a whole movement that has been around the world in the last 12 years and spawned several side projects.

After intense preparation, the Oasis participants are each given roles best suited to their skills. The names for these roles sounded more like classes in a role playing game: Oracle, Time Keeper, Lighthouse, Guardian Angel, Gnome, Hunter, Messenger...

I had goosebumps by the end of the presentation. Maybe there was a way for someone like me to contribute after all.

A few months later, Ruth brought us exciting news: the Oasis game would be coming to UK for the first time. It would be played in Newham, an area in the shadow of the London City Airport and 2012 Olympic Games frenzy. Expensive private property developments aimed at rich commuters are muscling in on previously council-house territory. The local residents are like a dirty secret, airbrushed from the gleaming façade of the city. A group of determined activists, calling themselves the Momentum Project, has already started to change things little by little, by hosting community events and trying to convince locals that “you don’t have to move out of your community to live in a better one”. Partnering with the Oasis game meant a much larger group would be there to create a short burst of intense activity and hopefully, a lasting legacy.

I asked Ruth if she would let me participate. Apologising for my lack of volunteering experience, not really knowing exactly what the training and the project would involve, but convinced that if I didn’t throw myself in it now I would never have the guts to. To my astonishment, Ruth not only said yes, she seemed delighted that I had asked.

We were told to pack for six days and be ready for hard work. The Dutch branch of the ELOS institute was organising this game and we received a comprehensive welcome pack and instructions on what to bring in advance. It certainly dealt with the logistical side of things but nothing could have prepared us for the actual experience itself.

On the first night, arriving at the Ibis budget hotel (accommodation which turned out to feel not unlike sleeping in a large bathroom), I did feel a sudden flash of doubt that I had made a mistake. The lobby was populated by people who looked every inch the eco warrior, world-traveller, activist and hippie hero. Just in case you haven’t worked it out by now, I really don’t. At 40 years of age I was also the oldest person in the room. When waiting for our training to start at the Asta community centre next morning, I tweeted: “The Oasis training is about to start. A room full of young volunteers… and me.”

The facilitators were Rodrigo from Brazil, Niels from Netherlands and Conchi from Spain. Unlike any other training course I’ve been on, they took control of the room in a very calm and subtly manipulative way, coaxing things out of us and getting us to agree to seemingly bizarre activities. Instead of long-winded explanations and theory, we were coached to find our own answers. Instead of asking us who we were, they asked us how we were feeling.

We spent a long time that first day finding ways in which to connect to each other and to ourselves. As New Age as that sounds, this methodology was the foundation without which the Oasis game simply wouldn’t have worked. I had decided to accept whatever would be asked of us and to be very open to new ways of doing things. This attitude paid off. Over the next six days I learned a great deal about teamwork and about myself.

Our modern work environments often teach us to fall back on old routines. We often focus on the “how” instead of the “why”, and we often completely ignore the people involved in the process; the real human experience that we all share, but try our best to push out of the way when there’s work to be done. We also tend to focus on what there is to fix, rather than what we can create. By asking us to throw ourselves in and embrace whatever happened; by not giving us the answers and asking us to get rid of the superficial layer that we are all so focused on in our normal daily lives, we learned ways in which to find the right thing to do. Going out to knock on the doors and striking up conversations with strangers in an unfamiliar area wasn’t quite as daunting. We had to be ready to spend the next few days making these connections and fuel a small local miracle.

It was a little frightening at first. Usually, one would set off to work on a project like this with far more theory and planning. We obviously trusted that our facilitators knew what was going on under the surface, and that they knew what they were doing. But still the first couple of days felt a bit like going to a new place blindfolded, and having to work out where you are and what to do without any further instruction.

The most bizarre thing about this methodology was that although the pace we were learning and moving at during instruction seemed slow and serene, the amount of work we accomplished in six days would have taken most people a month. By skilfully reading us and tapping into us, we were coached to skip many of the steps that one would normally assume this type of project had to include. I was left wondering how many days, weeks, even months of my life I have wasted in meetings and presentations that ultimately just served to add extra padding to otherwise simple concepts. It occurred to me that perhaps we are frightened of simplicity.

There are seven steps to making the Oasis game happen: - The Appreciative Gaze: Appreciative way to observe the local community. A way to focus on what’s there and what about it is beautiful. Getting rid of your prejudices. - Affection: Encouraging the creation of genuine connections between people based on common values and trust. - The Dream: To create a space where people can express their most true and ambitious dreams for their community. Not focusing on the negative or problem solving, but focusing on something real that can be achieved now. - Care: The careful planning of projects and strategies so that they include the community’s collective dreams in all of their diversity. The right ones are good for yourself, good for your neighbour and good for the planet. - The Miracle: The actual project, where members of the community and Oasis participants make one of the dreams into a reality together. This part used to be called “Action” but at the end of every game, the locals used to say “it was a miracle”. - Celebration: Coming together at the end of the journey to share the joy of working together. A party! - Re-evolution: The legacy of the game; a new cycle of expanding dreams and to discover the potential within.

During days 1-to-4 we focused on the first four steps. Every day started with a vegan breakfast and a song and a dance. We were taught different dances and different songs and always with the minimum instruction. “Just watch what I do”, said Rodrigo. We did, and we danced. The first time many of us seemed a little clumsy or nervous but over the week dancing became an important part of our daily routine. It was a metaphor for working together; it made us closer and raised our heartbeat, ready to go out full of energy. Sharing the laughter from failed steps or silly moves was all part of the plan. We weren’t meant to become professional dancers, we were meant to enjoy the process and gain something from it.

On the first day, we practiced the Appreciative Gaze by walking around the community blindfolded, gently guiding each other and trying to get an impression of our surroundings without the prejudice that using your eyes as the primary source of information often brings. We learned that sometimes you see better with your eyes closed. We learned to trust each other fast. We learned not to worry about looking very silly.

The local kids responded to us first. Some of them followed us on the first day when we were out with blindfolds.

We went out again, this time with our eyes open and found beautiful things. We tried to find the people behind the beauty. By the end of the week, we had a small but devoted crew of local children who helped us literally drum up attention when we turned our volume up a notch and went to shout on the streets to broadcast the time and location for the community meeting we were organising. The last time I went out to shout on the streets was an anti-nukes demonstration back home in Finland in the 80s. Yet by the time we were ready to get the megaphone out and march through the streets of Newham to draw attention, I was first in line to join the crew. Shouting shoulder to shoulder with seasoned activists seemed perfectly natural. We wore fluorescent vests and chanted: “Asta centre, six thirty; share your dreams, six thirty!”

Curtains were parted. Doors were opened. Dreams were gathered. People who had said they wouldn’t come sneaked in to see what the fuss was about. Once the spark caught, the community woke up and took ownership and they were the ones that made it all happen.

We realised that we were all facilitators and that we were merely nudging things that were already there to wake up and spring into action. Cautious but curious people from all walks of life filled the community meeting room, and started building models of what they would like to create during the coming weekend. Suddenly the whole thing was theirs. Suddenly it was the most natural thing in the world. Suddenly they believed it could happen. There was a palpable shift that night from our hands to theirs. Some of us cried a little. Possibly out of relief.

Just like sometimes it takes a child to point out the obvious, or a new employee to question long-held beliefs in an organisation, we, total strangers to Newham, were able to gently coax out a small transformation. It felt so simple yet profound. If more people around the world could find a way to energise each other this way, what could be possible?

In many of the locations where the Oasis game has been played, there is a real lack of infrastructure so the projects often focus on creating that, and there usually aren’t many objections from local councils and town planners. But even in England, where people assume that they can’t change their environment because of bureaucracy, those assumptions should be challenged. Once the community is mobilised, it’s surprising what can be done.

The Silvertown community chose to transform a derelict outdoor terrace on the side of the Asta centre. They turned it into a usable, shared area with a dance floor for street dance practice; tables, chairs, a garden and a pizza oven.

One of the talented young men, Hilton, had expressed a very specific wish: to have a piano there. Lotte from our group had popped in her piano-shaped pencil sharpener to decorate one of the models. Since we would have to source all the materials locally and obtain as much as possible through donations and abandoned scrap, a piano seemed a touch too ambitious, but we were all secretly hoping that one would magically appear.

On the morning of the project itself, we were all energised, but also somewhat nervous. How many people would come? What if we couldn’t deliver the dream?

Our roles were assigned. Throughout the week, I’d been broadcasting our activities using the Momentum Project’s social media channels, preparing the presentation to the community and keeping our chaotic notes and flipcharts in some kind of order. When the little cards with descriptions of the roles were taken out on the morning of our first project day, none of us knew which ones we’d adopt yet.

The descriptions were read out and willing, suitable candidates selected. Gnomes looked after greenery and recycling, the Messenger would register and document things and tell others about what was happening… wait, that was me! I volunteered to be the Messenger. I had already been one and didn’t know it.

One of the biggest jobs for the actual project itself was to source a myriad of materials, preferably from the local community, and for free. We had several task forces out to carry in abandoned tyres, do a bit of guerrilla gardening, knock on doors and ask to borrow tools and approach local businesses for small donations. I had brought my car and ferried people to pick up paint brushes from a local hardware store, went to B&Q to pick up the play-sand they had kindly donated, and drove to a skip and dug out damaged bricks from it. Once the community members themselves were mobilised, materials and donations started pouring in and we soon had enough to get started.

I used Freecycle to find some missing elements and we had a small budget for electrical necessities such as plug sockets. It was my task to find an electrician and after scouring the Yellow Pages for one that lived locally but being unable to get hold of anyone, I took a break to clear my head in the kitchen. Yvonne, a local community member who’d attended some of our meetings was there, helping Agatha, our cook who’d been feeding 30 people for a week, always smiling.

I had a chat with them and when I mentioned that I had been unable to find an electrician, it turned out that one of Yvonne’s neighbours was one and he could be persuaded to help us for the steep price of a chicken chow mein. I grabbed Yvonne and we headed to the local Chinese take-away.

Amina from our group came to me with spectacular news: after we’d spread the word that we were looking for a piano, she had actually found a lady called Karen via Gumtree who just happened to have a piano languishing in her shed and was willing to donate it!

When the piano arrived, Hilton, whose wish it had been to get one, immediately put it to the test. Even out of tune, hearing this young man suddenly turn out a perfect piece of moving classical music in the middle of the chaos that was the project weekend was inspiring. So inspiring, in fact, that I had an idea: what if we could wheel the piano outdoors and film him playing on it, on the streets of Newham?

Amina had an even better idea. Unbeknownst to me, she had worked as a children’s music coach. She wanted to get a group of the local kids together and do something with them. Amina’s choir practice and the kids’ songwriting formed a memorable thread throughout the weekend, and culminated in a one-off live performance that was captured on video at the start of our sixth stage of the Oasis game: the Celebration.

Pizza oven, dance floor, giant mirror, bathtub full of play-sand, a whole new garden area, tables and chairs, lots of colour: the Oasis gamers and the community worked hard for two days and transformed a previously derelict space.

Every hour new people drifted in, curious about what was happening. Parts of the community that would never have imagined working together, now did. We had a spread of ages and ethnic backgrounds, and everyone pitched in. Like our feeble attempts at learning a new dance, but really bonding through stumbling along together, the community formed new bonds and connections by pushing to get this project done within the time allocated.

There was love and laughter and it was clear that something other than painting fences was happening beneath the surface. The journey was always the point. It mattered that we listened to the community’s dreams and that they all felt personally involved and committed. It didn’t really matter what we would build together just that we would build it together.

03 July 2010

Twitter is at the bottom-feeder end of Information Overload. Ipad is at the top. Both can be useful and delightful, but recently, I've decided to develop a much stricter attitude to what kind of information I give room in my life to. I don't need to know everything. I don't need to have access to more books than I can read in a lifetime. Frankly, the thought depresses me.

I can choose what and when I think about things. Thinking. Remember that, people? Stuffing every orifice full of media and everyone else's inane chatter is not good for you.

Yes, read. Yes, talk to people. Of course. But for Heaven's sake, don't binge on all the chaff, Z-list celebrity gossip and tiniest minutiae of peripheral news items. You don't need it. Don't grant space in your head for it.

The thing about Twitter and any tool is learning how to get what you want out of it. Use it cleverly. Don't allow it to suck you in and convince you that it's important. It is not. Take control of it.

Many people seem to throw themselves at online forums, blogs and social networking sites like an inexperienced rider on a Ducati motorcycle. They think they can ride it, but the bike takes off under them and the machine is driving them.

I love online forums, blogs and social networking sites. I've been active online since there was such a thing as 'online'. It's just now I'm finally learning to use these damn things properly.

Twitter is for getting to know what my favourite people and companies are up to. It occasionally also just makes me giggle. Like this morning, when someone wrote: "Dear delusional teenage girls. A guy who glitters and won't have sex with you is not a vampire. He's gay." Twilight, The Eclipse is released in UK this weekend and it's Gay Pride today. Blam. What a lovely little witticism. Then it's time to turn off the computer and go outside. Or to the cinema.

20 June 2009

Finns are drowning, getting drunk and crashing their cars this weekend. They are also building big bonfires, eating sausages, swimming naked in the sea or in one of the 155.000 lakes, heating up saunas - and some might even be collecting wild flowers and putting them under their pillows based on old love spells.

It's Juhannus (Midsummer) in Finland and I feel homesick. I miss some of the above. Not the drunken, drowning part. I miss the odd, golden haze of Finnish summer evenings. I miss Puffet ice cream sandwiches. I miss the way supermarket cash register staff don't look at you in the eyes and how you have to pay for your plastic bags. I miss the cheesy Finnish soap operas and reading old, yellowing Aku Ankka (Donald Duck) pocketbooks at the summer house. I miss having space to move around, even in the cities, without feeling suffocated.

I would love to go for a midnight swim, or for a stroll in the forest.

When I moved to England over 16 years ago, one of the many things I didn't quite realise was that I'd be swapping space for crowds.

Today the population density of Finland is 15/km2 and the population density of England is 392/km2. Even the numbers tell you that one place is crowded and the other one is not, but I made an image to illustrate the difference. Whilst the figures would have changed in 16 years, the ratio would have remained similar.

Of course one has to take non-arable land into consideration (there are all those lakes in Finland after all. And when you take a birds-eye view, the whole country looks like a giant forest, splattered about with water and the odd field and town). Most of Finns live in the cities and down the south. There is a tendency for city-dwelling Finns to huddle together for warmth and resources; it is normal and expected for people from all sorts of backgrounds to live in blocks of flats. Sharing the heat, sauna and laundry facilities makes sense in the harsh conditions that are the norm for majority of the year.

The Finnish summer is bittersweet; heart-breakingly beautiful, but so fleeting that half of it is spent recovering from the winter and the other half anticipating its return.

Even keeping all of the above in mind, one place is crowded the other one is not. There is a difference in how it feels to be here and how it feels to be over there.

But here's the real catch: I've grown accustomed to having lots of people everywhere. Visiting Finland makes me feel a little uneasy. Where is everybody?

Yet in my heart I crave space. The wonderful duality of expat psyche.

Finns are, generally speaking, rather homogeneous. There is the same stuff in the shops, the same aesthetic preferences, the same morals, the same political leanings. When viewed from the outside, that is. And when generalising rather broadly. Nevertheless, the homogeneousness is noticeable from this angle and is perhaps one of the other reasons why, after a while, staying in Finland makes me feel like I've been sealed in Tupperware. You have to get out and take a deep breath. And of course, living away from it all, I fill my home with reminders from Finland. The same stuff, the same aesthetic preferences, the same morals, the same political leanings. I finally found a guy with whom a relationship seemed easy and right. His mother is half-Finnish. Etc, etc, etc.

There is a deep comfort in being among people who, without any effort, think and feel like you do. Living abroad is a constant daily mental effort; I once assumed that this would be eliminated over time, but I'm not so sure any more. On the surface (spoken language, body language, writing, appearance, manners, rituals...) one can become very well adapted; almost indistinguishable from the real deal. A bit of an accent in everything you say or do, but almost, almost. I think and dream in English. I no longer accidentally offend people quite so often (reading "Watching the English" helped with that). I blend in locally, in London and almost anywhere in England and the UK as a whole. There are so many different types of people living over here anyway that this is relatively easy.

But your deepest feelings, memories and psyche remain rooted in where you came from. Ironically, when I lived in Finland, I never felt I belonged there either. Only once I'd moved away, I gradually realised just how Finnish I really am.

The summer holiday season will soon be over. The Juhannus-celebration marks the start of the real Finnish summer. This year I may be able to pop over in September, but by then, I won't find fresh berries on the market stalls or get to swim in a lake. But this year is different - my best friend is becoming a mother and her baby is due then. She only recently came to visit London with her mum, but I miss her already. And, as I've mentioned before, she's the only reason it truly sucks to be away. With everything else, one can make do.

26 March 2008

"The more I think about it, the more geeky I realise I am," I said to Timo today. Having just returned from Eastercon, it's no wonder I've not floated down to "somewhat normal" yet.

"What, you're surprised by that?" Timo replied.

"No, what I mean is that there are a few things I'd always taken to be my little quirks, which I now realise are traits shared with many others. This sounds so naive, but I really didn't think that there'd be so many people for whom having complete sets of things, or having such sets categorised and organised in some specific way would be as important."

I'm not a collector; not exactly. There are very narrow areas in which I'd say it's important to have the set for its own sake. Mostly that happens to me with books.

Today, whilst dusting the shelves (and looking for Timo's copy of Coraline, which Neil Gaiman's comments during the Darker than Potter panel made me want to read), I spotted a pattern.

The book series for non-SF/Fantasy fiction, say, by a Finnish crime publishing house, are uniform in colour and typeface, but don't have numbers on the spines. Same goes for "modern classics" and, upon further inspection, all other mainstream fiction series we have knocking around. Hmm.

Whereas - most of the SF/Fantasy book series are numbered. Even "...best new SF" uses this device, even though it might have made sense to print the actual year for which these are meant to be the "best" collections for. Instead they've sequenced using numbers. And the numbers are big on the spine too; it'll be really obvious if you've missed one.

I wonder if this is a deliberate attempt by marketing departments to tap into the geeky tendencies of the target audience for these books. If it is, it's working and I'm impressed.

Something else that's impressed me - Neil's business sense and his ability to use it in subtle and effective ways. Coraline did get mentioned rather a lot during the con and what do you know; it's due to be released as a film soon. And if you're quick, you can still download a free copy of American Gods from his website (but expect to feel the urge to buy it afterwards - the sales of this book have gone up significantly since the freebie offer).

Someone asked Neil: "Since you record and sell audio books, does it bother you that these have been made illegally available via peer-to-peer download services?"

He replied by asking how many people in the audience had found their favourite author by buying a book they knew nothing about, apart from the blurb on the cover. Some hands went up. He then asked: "How many of you found your favourite author for free; through borrowing a book, or by some other means?" A forest of arms shot up.

"See?" said Neil.

By doing this sort of thing, he is clever on so many levels. Instead of demonising potential fans, he works with them. Instead of struggling upstream against the inevitable changes in how the market and technology is evolving, he swims with the current and uses it to his advantage.

I've got into the habit of listening to podcasts and audio books whilst sat at airports waiting for delayed flights, or trying to relax in uncomfortable hotel rooms. I found Stardust as an audio book on iTunes, narrated by Neil - and am now tempted to buy it. Can't decide whether it would be silly, considering I have it as an actual book (now also autographed; thank you very much!).

There is no way I'd use a peer-to-peer service, just in case you're wondering.

31 October 2006

Shaolin Monks was great. A mixture between Martial arts prowess, energetic dance and stagemanship; it was a Martial arts circus. Definitely something to see (I could add the nauseating: for the whole family). There were spectacular shows of well-practiced moves, the circus-element of brick-breaking and balancing on sharp spikes seemed to appeal to the younger audience and there were moments when the cartwheels and rolling on stage held a striking resemblance to Breakdance.

The highlight of the show was a double-act by two very young boys - they looked like they were under 7 years old, but their size might have been misleading. They effortlessly sparred, skipped and hopped through complicated Kung-Fu moves with the sort of ease that usually follows years and years of tireless practice. Watching them was like an optical illusion that made the audience gasp time and time again; it was like watching miniature adults.

We did notice one thing - the audience was completely different from the last Sadler's Wells production we went to see. Yes, lots of families, but also people who looked like they'd never set foot in a theatre before. Many people arriving really late. Or talking during the performance. I don't care if it's your first time when you're 48 years old, but you could at least observe some polite common sense rules on how to conduct yourself.

Perhaps that's harsh. But seriously. Granted, not everyone was taken to their first concert/opera/theatre performance at under 5 years old, taught to sit still and focus, taught to figure out the plot of an opera sung in another language from looking through the programme booklet, but I do idly wonder whether common sense about certain things has to be taught too. Is common sense something you can, or have to teach?

It seems that many Finns still value opera, classical music and the theatre in the sort of way I was used to. In that you don't have to be wealthy, or in any kind of particular social class to take yourself (and your kids) off to see the latest production of The Magic Flute. At least that's the impression I get from the delightful film "Pelikaanimies" (Pelican Man), a film we watched yesterday. I bought it on our Finnish trip this summer, but we hadn't got around to watching it until now. Pelican Man is a simple, but delightful fantasy aimed at children, but entirely watchable by adults. One day a pelican decides to turn himself into a human by landing on a beach and putting on human clothes. The film explores human perception, what it's like to be an adult and what it's like to be a little boy whose parents have just divorced. There is lovely Finnish scenery and a beautiful feel to the whole film.

27 August 2006

First, a small aside: I was listening to Radio 4 yesterday on the way to work (as I always do when I drive in; it's the sort of thing that seems right in the mornings) and the decline of "traditional newspapers" was being discussed. Apparently newspapers, in their frenzy to halt the declining circulation figures, have given away more DVDs in UK this year than the UK consumers bought from shops. That definitely smacks of desperation.

However, I don't think the newspaper will die entirely. There may be some form of the "paper" left, even if the best part does happen online. Take The Guardian. A little while back, one of the supplements in the Guardian newspaper published an article entitled "Should we worry about Soya in our food?". It was a well articulated and effective article. As someone who has been lactose intolerant from birth and always hated the taste of neat cow's milk, I've been a mass consumer of soy milk products for years. And here, in this article, a reputable newspaper was saying that, actually...

...soya contains toxins and plant oestrogens powerful enough to disrupt women's menstrual cycles in experiments. It also appeared damaging to the thyroid." James's lobbying eventually forced governments to investigate. In 2002, the British government's expert committee on the toxicity of food (CoT) published the results of its inquiry into the safety of plant oestrogens, mainly from soya proteins, in modern food. It concluded that in general the health benefits claimed for soya were not supported by clear evidence and judged that there could be risks from high levels of consumption for certain age groups. Yet little has happened to curb soya's growth since.

That was uncomfortable reading, but the article had more in store:

...raw mature soya beans contain phytates that prevent mineral absorption and enzyme inhibitors that block the key enzymes we need to digest protein. They are also famous for inducing flatulence.

Christopher Dawson, who owns the Clearspring brand of organic soy sauces, agrees. He lived in Japan for 18 years and his Japanese wife, Setsuko, is a cookery teacher. "I never saw soy beans on the table in Japan - they're indigestible."

Dawson describes the traditional craft method of transforming the soya bean through fermentation, so that its valuable amino acids become available but its antinutrients are tamed. The process involves cooking whole soya beans, complete with their oil, for several hours, then adding the spores of a mould to the mix, and leaving it to ferment for three days to begin the long process of breaking down the proteins and starches. This initial brew is then mixed with salt water and left to ferment for a further 18 months, during which time the temperature will vary with the seasons. The end result is an intensely flavoured condiment in which the soya's chemical composition has been radically altered. Traditional miso is similarly made with natural whole ingredients, slowly aged.

The article presents quite a few alarming points for consideration. That the soy bean was not even considered fit for animal feed in its natural form; that the isoflavones (supposedly famed for their health benefits) may actually be doing us harm, and so on and so on. Reading through it, I felt fairly convinced. I would have to cut out soy milk and find an alternative that wasn't cow's milk. Fermented Tofu, Miso and Soy sauce would still be okay to eat.

And here's the bit where my aside from the beginning becomes relevant. I decided to look the article up on the Guardian Unlimited website, just in case there had been any further discussion on the topic. A rebuttal was posted and entertaining comments added. Too right there had been discussion! This is the bit where the Internet wins hands down. I've touched on this subject in my own posts before (about how the "article" - be it a blog post or a newspaper article - is only the beginning, where the Internet is concerned, whereas in a dead tree publication you may get a few letters to the editor, or may not, but there is unlikely to be instant and comprehensive two-way dialogue about the subject).

Sadly, the quality of the rebuttal in the case of the Soy argument was not particularly high - it really did seem more Ad Hominem attack than a proper counter-point that would have attacked the original article's research instead of attacking the people behind the article. Nevertheless, it is always good to have more than one viewpoint, particularly since most people have an agenda to promote something or another.

One of the most amusing comments posted as a reply to the rebuttal, comes from someone calling themselves "germanvegan":

I find it rather silly that the motivation of vegans to oppose or support a view is projected onto the same level as commercial interest, thus greed. People seem to either deny, forget or ignore that vegans are ETHICISTS. Like, hello?

Secondly, and to increase the silliness, one should know that the defamation of soy started the second it was clear that it contained all essential amino acids. You know, like meat. This sent all the people with their claws hacked into the glass of the meat counter into a panic frenzy. In their mind, this was a threat to their beloved meat. This continued even when common nutritional scientists backpeddled on their antivegan stance claiming plant proteins are inferior, when in reality all one had to do is eat two different plants at different times with different protein contend to have a complete dietary protein ratio.

Germanvegan makes some good points there. His comment goes on beyond the bits I quoted. He fails to consider that promoting a vegan lifestyle could still be considered a business interest. Nothing is ever that black and white. Sadly. Life would be so much easier if that weren't the case.

It's usually best to take everything with a pinch of salt (or should that be with a pinch of soy sauce?) and do your own research if you are truly concerned about something. So my question "to Soy or not to Soy" has therefore not yet been answered to my satisfaction.

One of my biggest pet hates about people, is the frequency with which you bump into single-minded blinkerdness (sorry, I just made up that word; hope you don't mind). People with such need to be right about something that they willfully ignore evidence, or don't even realise they're ignoring it, or interpreting it to suit their agenda. Having said that, it's almost impossible for any human being to be wholly objective, but that's another blog post's worth of material, so I'll leave that there for now.

18 July 2006

Just a quick "hi" from my friends' computer at Helsinki's Punavuori. It's been a mixed visit so far. I am over the moon about being with my family (that's who they are, really) and it is wonderful to eat lots of Finnish chocolate, sleep enough and mill around aimlessly. Kind of like being on holiday, oddly enough.

But there's a melancholy tone to this visit. It breaks my heart to see a certain kind of veil - part dirt, part apathy - covering what used to be my old hunting ground. I've posed a question to my dear friends: what the hell happened to Helsinki? More to the point: what the hell happened to Finland?

The standards of maintenance, availability of fresh produce and type of customer service you might expect now resemble any random European country, but before they used to be better. It really used to be true when we described Finland as a clean and pure place. It doesn't appear to be true any more. I'm so saddened by the drop in standards that I've considered sending a letter to the editor of Helsingin Sanomat (Finland's largest daily newspaper).

Anyway. It's not all doom and gloom! I guess I'm just feeling a little odd at the moment. Trying to establish how much of this is the outside-in effect of coming back year after year to an ever changing country and how much of the change is actually for worse.

Meanwhile, Timo and I have started to make real wedding plans. We're meeting a Finnish wedding planner tomorrow and we might end up booking their services. Depends how complicated an affair it's developing into. We're still not in favour of pomp, but it seems that Timo has a guestlist three times the size of mine, so we may need some help in arranging even a simple kind of party!

I'm not really on the computer much this week (we'll be in the countryside tomorrow, swimming in a lake somewhere), so apologies if I don't reply to comments until I return to UK.

01 July 2006

He bought FireFly and Serenity on DVD and made me (yes, forced me!) to start watching. He thought I might like them. Well, he was wrong.

I fell in love with them instead.

The fucker! After getting caught up in the characteristic Joss Whedon layers of emerging and intriguing stories, ready to bubble into the surface... I get told, sorry, you'll never find out how they'll develop. Will they, won't they? Does River lose it completely, or will she now become the best pilot in the known universe? What was all that about Book's past? How... when... who?

We watched couple of episodes a night, finally finishing with the film yesterday evening, and then, it was all over. I sat on the floor, forlorn, repeatedly mewling: I want more FlyFly.

This is indeed, a cruel and hard world. And there are too many moronic American TV executives who should have their innards fed to them in some peppery sauce.

Theme from Firefly

Take my love.Take my land.Take me where I cannot stand.I don’t care, I’m still free.You can’t take the sky from me.

Take me outto the black.Tell ‘em I ain’t comin’ back.Burn the land and boil the sea.You can’t take the sky from me.

Have no placeI can beSince I found Serenity.But you can’t take the sky from me.

27 May 2006

It's lovely to have alternatives available for "conventional", Western medicine. It's nice to have an "open mind". I make these statements with only a touch of wryness; I do sincerely try to keep an open mind. Nevertheless, I am really rather relieved to read news reports about a group of leading British doctors who have directly challenged the way many NHS trusts use their funds.

A GROUP of Britain’s leading doctors has urged every NHS trust to stop paying for alternative medicine and to use the money for conventional treatments. Their appeal is a direct challenge to the Prince of Wales’s outspoken campaign to widen access to complementary therapies. Public funding of “unproven or disproved treatments” such as homoeopathy and reflexology, which are promoted by the Prince, is unacceptable while huge NHS deficits are forcing trusts to sack nurses and limit access to life-saving drugs, the doctors say. As reported by The Times Online

I have very little faith in the NHS, as some of you may already know, but, rather ironically, the aforementioned doctors' lack of faith towards unproven alternative therapies is increasing my faith towards the doctors.

Some alternative therapies may form a solid support mechanism for suffering patients, but I do think they should be an optional extra; a luxury in a way; not something that the taxpayers pay for. If any of the alternative therapies would be scientifically proven to be consistently effective in treating serious conditions, I'd be saying different things.

If I have a tension headache, or if I am feeling the pressure of stress, aromatherapy might help. But I wouldn't dream of making someone else pay for my treatment.

If I have an incurable disease for which I am receiving conventional treatment, I might also wish to use some additional therapies. But the additional therapies should be a choice, an extra and entirely at the expense of the private individual.

Some alternative therapies seem to hover between the line of "conventional" and "alternative". That's when this whole thing becomes very messy and it's hard to hold on to a hard line on either side of the argument. The BBC website has a wonderful set of resources, examining these very issues:

Research conducted by the BBC has shown that alternative medicines are becoming increasingly popular. Yet their effectiveness is yet to be proven to the majority of medical practitioners in the UK and there are concerns over safety as many of the treatments remain untested. BBC News Online's health team examines the issues.

Let me elaborate (although the above statement sums it all up quite tidily). The original concept of Homeopathy, when explained to a person to whom metaphysical matters are of interest, will sound inviting, promising and even plausible.

To treat the patient with a little bit of what might be making them unwell.

Classical homeopathy is generally defined as a system of medical treatment based on the use of minute quantities of remedies that in larger doses produce effects similar to those of the disease being treated. Hahnemann believed that very small doses of a medication could have very powerful healing effects because their potency could be affected by vigorous and methodical shaking (succussion). Hahnemann referred to this alleged increase in potency by vigorous shaking as dynamization. Hahnemann thought succussion could release "immaterial and spiritual powers," thereby making substances more active. "Tapping on a leather pad or the heel of the hand was alleged to double the dilution" (ibid.). From (the utterly scrumptious) The Sceptic's Dictionary.

So, the original concept seemed to have a little bit of potential, well, to gullible sorts anyway, but good grief. Basing the entire treatment on how much, and through which very specific methods it has been diluted?

Let me put this in other terms. Let's say we start with a few drops of a plant extract. All well and good. I actually DO believe that plant-based medicine and treatments can be incredibly effective. After all, much of the now so-called conventional medicine started that way.

However, in Hocus-pocus-pathy, you take the plant extracts, dilute, shake... then take the diluted mixture, add a few drops of that to a new batch of water and dilute, shake... then take the diluted mixture, add a few drops of that... well, so on and so forth, until the final "remedy" has as many molecules of the original plant as you would randomly find by chance in, say, sea water.

Just think about that quietly for a moment.

Various tincture-based elements are then added (alcohol, grapeseed oil, or perhaps something else to give the remedy a medicinal consistency) and abracadabra, a cure-all is ready!

Homeopathy is based on the notion that water has a memory. That its molecules can remember the presence of a substance that, for all intents and purposes is no longer there.

Did I mention the word BOLLOCKS yet?

What homeopathic practitioners do very effectively, is provide consultative, holistic treatment to their patients, complete with such apparent (or quite possibly very sincere) care for the wellbeing of the patients that the experience in itself must be very healing. And I don't dispute that. I just so wish that people weren't being told, well, bollocks.

I wish that if a practitioner were to set up a councelling and spiritual support service, they'd just set up one of those; not a charlatan outfit designed to exploit the weak and vulnerable. Homeopathy is the Scientology of alternative therapies and I really don't think it's fair to charge people horrid amounts for so-called remedies and therapies when it's all a bit of a con, really.

It's been bugging me for some time to know that in this country, my tax money has gone towards paying for someone's homeopathy treatment - I would certainly let out a little whoop of delight if NHS dropped that form of alternative therapy from their list of funded services. It is none of my business if people wish to pay for this kind of stuff privately (it doesn't harm me; and I know lots of people get something very real out of it), but I don't think it has any place whatsoever standing shoulder-to-shoulder with therapies that have been scientifically proven to be effective.

27 January 2006

There were at least two things wrong with that sentence, but no, you weren't imagining it. I'll allow you time to re-arrange your reading glasses on your noggin and to wipe that ridicilous grin off your face.

You see, Timo, my gorgeous half-Finn, half-Northern Irish love, is an avid football fan. Luckily not in the Eeeeeenglaaaaand-beer-bellied-going-out-to-get-smashed-wiv-the-lads-way, but rather, in that Fever Pitch-a-tad-obsessed-about-club-football-specifically-about-Arsenal-way.

Which, to a person like me, previously uneducated about these important differences, and ignorantly assuming that all football fans were alike, is a lesson learned. No, Timo didn't just make me write that. Although, I do think that he has subtly brainwashed me. A little. But I think I volunteered.

Not only am I beginning to understand the offside rule, I've now actually been to a football match (not just any match, but Arsenal versus Wigan, which was held on Tuesday at the Highbury stadium. Highbury is a place full of history, has beautiful Art Deco facade, and is due to be closed as a stadium and converted into flats. Arsenal FC will move to a new stadium nearby).

The picture on the left is of a penalty shoot-out (click for larger version), which, sadly, did not result in a goal for Arsenal. It is quite amusing to see how superstitious many of the devoted fans are - Timo kept on saying that he wished he hadn't taken that picture, because obviously, that's what proved to be unlucky for Arse. Yeaaaah.

When we were waiting for the match to start, outside the Gunners pub near the stadium, one of Timo's friends commented: "So, it's her first time at a match. Hope she's lucky".

A coach full of Wigan fans travelled past and the people inside thumped and jeered so viciously that I wouldn't have been surprised if they would have managed to break the windows and spill out onto the street. I guess there's a reason the Gunners has a sign above the door, stating: "Home fans only".

The match itself was exciting, but uncomfortable and frustrating. Exciting, because it was a new experience and because I couldn't help but get drawn in to the trance-like state of willing those players to get that fucking ball into that fucking net. Already.

Uncomfortable because it was very, very cold. One of the coldest nights this winter, with temperatures below freezing. And frustrating, because despite a score of 2-1 in favour of Arsenal, it was Wigan who came out as the winners, due to the calculations that determine the winning statistic when deciding who moves forward in the contest. And with this being the second match, and with Wigan having scored higher in the previous one... bah.

I've joined the club as a Red Member, which means that I'm now automatically in line for a Gold Member status (which, sadly, doesn't come with complimentary schmokes and pancakes*, but does mean that the likelihood of being able to obtain match tickets is higher). Timo is also a Red Member, and has joined another kind of line... the ridicilously long one for season tickets. His queue number is 37758. Maybe his grandchild might get a season ticket. If he's lucky.

I wish Arseblog would have been nominated as best sports blog in the 2006 Bloggies, but perhaps the regular visitors (or those witty and clever people who leave the most comments on any weblog, ever, according to Arseblogger) were too busy commenting and not busy enough nominating. For shame. Next year?

11 November 2005

This morning, a neighbour knocked on the door. It was just at that awkward time when Timo is getting dressed and I'm in the shower. Timo opened the bathroom door just wide enough to grab his robe.

I heard murmured, just-woken-up voices, but nothing more. The front door slammed shut. I assumed it had been something to do with the post, or maybe with rubbish again. Last week some bright spark had found his way inside our rubbish room and re-arranged the bins to a leaning tower of Pisa (all the wheelie bins are inside a room, out of sight, just by the front door to the building).

As I got out of the shower, I realised Timo was no longer indoors. He'd gone out in his robe.

I put the kettle on. He walked back in.

"I'm afraid it's not good news for cars out there this morning."

"What do you mean?"

"Some wanker has poured acid over all the cars in the residential car park."

"WHAT?"

"I'm sorry, but they got yours too. Poor Smart."

"..."

Timo rang the police and washed the remaining acid off the car. Luckily, the Smart's unusual design means it had not been damaged even nearly as much as most of the other cars had been. The acid-throwers had aimed at the roofs, but the Smart has a glass roof, which meant that Timo was able to just washed the acid off it. The back door is totally ruined, however, and there are some acid corroded splodges on the left panel and Tridion safety cell.

I rang my insurance company and a couple of garages. We'll have to pay a £200 excess, which really messes up our current budget; we are still tight until Timo's new, additional earnings begin to kick in.

Ultimately, this is just material. It doesn't matter. Still, I am gutted and feel surprisingly violated.

It's like someone has managed to touch my life without being invited to do so.

And I feel sad that even in this quiet, cosy town, there are people whose lives are empty and miserable enough to have to go around destroying things.

When we eventually get a house rather than a flat, I will insist on a double garage. That should help a little.